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> The House and Senate Armed Services committees have long had an interest in ensuring that unfiltered news went to the troops who are fighting for our country

by pjc50 6mo ago

> The House and Senate Armed Services committees have long had an interest in ensuring that unfiltered news went to the troops who are fighting for our country and deserved to read the truth, not propaganda. In the late 1980s Congress was alarmed at attempts of military personnel to “suppress unfavorable news” of the Iran-Contra affair and other issues. Congress mandated that Stars and Stripes be editorially independent and created the position of ombudsman in 1991 to monitor the situation and report to Congress at least once a year. Funny how the same situations of recent history keep resurfacing. Not only "Iran", but we should recall the details of Iran-Contra: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%80%93Contra_affair https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%80%93Contra_affair > further funding of the Contras by legislative appropriations was prohibited by Congress, but the Reagan administration continued funding them secretly using non-appropriated funds Oh look, it's presidential power contradicting Congress again! > "what began as a strategic opening to Iran deteriorated, in its implementation, into trading arms for hostages." US attempts to deal with Iran, has incoherent strategy, gets rolled, lies about it. > Eleven convictions resulted, some of which were vacated on appeal. The rest of those indicted or convicted were all pardoned in the final days of the presidency of George H. W. Bush Misuse of the presidential pardon power, again, which enables the president to direct people to commit crimes in the sure knowledge that they will not be held accountable to the law or other branches of government (Americans call this "checks and balances" for some reason). One of those people was Oliver North, who turned his experience providing arms illegally to enemies of the United States into a long career at propaganda organizations the NRA and Fox news. And so here you are again.

kakacik 6mo ago
One would expect that system would learn and change, and we wouldn't have trump fucking up half of global economy so beautifully on his morning whims just to get rich as a side business of being potus (or reverse, probably). Something tells me that after this dark period is over, there won't be many lessons learned and things changed for the better in the system. 'Great system' not being so great after all (which it isn't, there are much better and more democractic systems implemented all around the world). Republicans as usually will shield just about anybody including mass rapist and murderer just to not lose face, and democrats will just again have this inept look with 'we couldn't change a damn thing because XYZ but we asked nicely'.
- pjc50 6mo ago
  > One would expect that system would learn and change The system did learn and change: they got a lot better at exploiting it. The effort to stack the Supreme Court with Republican partisans took decades.
  - raisedbyninjas 6mo ago
    The system also learned to stop pressuring Republicans to resign in shame. Roger Ailes was a media consultant and advisor to Nixon. Ailes vision of a TV network that pushed a pro-GOP administration message under the banner of unbiased journalism manifested in Television News Incorporated and later Fox News. He viewed television as a useful tool to reach the lazy masses who preferred not to read the news or perform their own critical thinking.
    - bonesss 6mo ago
      IIRC Ailes believed that if the had some of the press with them that Nixon could have survived Watergate. And now we get near-daily “worse than Watergate” headlines and facts…
- le-mark 6mo ago
  > 'we couldn't change a damn thing because XYZ but we asked nicely' They literally can’t do anything. The constitution is structure so the party not in power can only obstruct legislation (filibuster). The current Supreme Court is literally rewriting the constitution or how the constitution has been interpreted for over one hundred years. They’re the bigger threat (to the US at least)
- atoav 6mo ago
  > One would expect that system would learn and change The problem I have with that is that the typical American I encounter online appears to not perceive themselves as part of that system. And if you read your own founding documents We The People are supposed to play a pretty profound role within that system. Only in the past year or ao I got the feeling that some appeared to have gotten the realization that they are not the temporarily embarrassed millionaires they always pictured themselves, but are in fact a lot closer to the homeless people whose tents you may pass by in your commute. Some may have even realized that this is not a failure of the system, but a feature for those people who you chose to represent you. The only two ways I see out of this mess is (1) collective bargaining (through unions and similar and (2) a ship of Theseus-like rebuilding of the established political personal within established party structures. Ideally both in tandem. Be part of the system and change it.
TitaRusell 6mo ago
It's interesting. Ministers of justice in the Netherlands stopped handing out pardons when they realised it lost them votes. Not a lot of bleeding hearts over here for criminals lol.
solid_fuel 6mo ago
The Trump administration is basically Reagan 2.0, but our political process has degraded to the point where the corruption and graft are even more blatant this time. Many of the current cabinet were involved in the Reagan admin too. Their actions are the same - gutting the administrative state, squashing environmental regulations, persecuting queer people and racial minorities. Mass deportations. These were all hallmarks of the terrible Reagan presidency too. Even "Make America Great Again" is a reused slogan from the Reagan days. Unfortunately the same uneducated morons who hold Reagan up as a great president are behind Trump right now, cheering this car crash of an administration even as they get us involved in new wars.
- mmooss 6mo ago
  I think that normalizes the radical changes Trump has made, including aggressively challenging election results, ending the independence of the Department of Justice and FBI, and using them to attack political enemies, extraordinary expansion of a federal law enforcement force (apparently to serve Trump's political interests), nationalist trade policies including high tariffs, undermining national security allies, undermining intelligence secrecy, appointing people highly unqualified by existing standards, threatening freedom of the press (including having private sector allies acquire a dominant share of news and other public communication), ...
  - solid_fuel 6mo ago
    You're right that it's worse this time, but I draw the comparison because I believe the same forces are at work. Reagan was installed because republicans and racists (I repeat myself) were upset about the civil rights movement. Trump was installed because republicans were upset about gay marriage and trans people. It's all grievance politics from the worlds most fragile children.
    - krapp 6mo ago
      > Trump was installed because republicans were upset about gay marriage and trans people. And Obama. Trumpism was in part a reactionary movement against mainstream conservatism from the alt-right/Tea Party set that the Republicans tried to court and control, who turned against the establishment when the Republicans wouldn't go far enough. It isn't at all a coincidence that the President after Obama was the man responsible for normalizing many of the conspiracy theories about him.

by pjc50 6mo ago

kakacik 6mo ago

One would expect that system would learn and change, and we wouldn't have trump fucking up half of global economy so beautifully on his morning whims just to get rich as a side business of being potus (or reverse, probably). Something tells me that after this dark period is over, there won't be many lessons learned and things changed for the better in the system. 'Great system' not being so great after all (which it isn't, there are much better and more democractic systems implemented all around the world). Republicans as usually will shield just about anybody including mass rapist and murderer just to not lose face, and democrats will just again have this inept look with 'we couldn't change a damn thing because XYZ but we asked nicely'.

pjc50 6mo ago
> One would expect that system would learn and change The system did learn and change: they got a lot better at exploiting it. The effort to stack the Supreme Court with Republican partisans took decades.
- raisedbyninjas 6mo ago
  The system also learned to stop pressuring Republicans to resign in shame. Roger Ailes was a media consultant and advisor to Nixon. Ailes vision of a TV network that pushed a pro-GOP administration message under the banner of unbiased journalism manifested in Television News Incorporated and later Fox News. He viewed television as a useful tool to reach the lazy masses who preferred not to read the news or perform their own critical thinking.
  - bonesss 6mo ago
    IIRC Ailes believed that if the had some of the press with them that Nixon could have survived Watergate. And now we get near-daily “worse than Watergate” headlines and facts…
le-mark 6mo ago
> 'we couldn't change a damn thing because XYZ but we asked nicely' They literally can’t do anything. The constitution is structure so the party not in power can only obstruct legislation (filibuster). The current Supreme Court is literally rewriting the constitution or how the constitution has been interpreted for over one hundred years. They’re the bigger threat (to the US at least)
atoav 6mo ago
> One would expect that system would learn and change The problem I have with that is that the typical American I encounter online appears to not perceive themselves as part of that system. And if you read your own founding documents We The People are supposed to play a pretty profound role within that system. Only in the past year or ao I got the feeling that some appeared to have gotten the realization that they are not the temporarily embarrassed millionaires they always pictured themselves, but are in fact a lot closer to the homeless people whose tents you may pass by in your commute. Some may have even realized that this is not a failure of the system, but a feature for those people who you chose to represent you. The only two ways I see out of this mess is (1) collective bargaining (through unions and similar and (2) a ship of Theseus-like rebuilding of the established political personal within established party structures. Ideally both in tandem. Be part of the system and change it.

TitaRusell 6mo ago

It's interesting. Ministers of justice in the Netherlands stopped handing out pardons when they realised it lost them votes. Not a lot of bleeding hearts over here for criminals lol.

solid_fuel 6mo ago

The Trump administration is basically Reagan 2.0, but our political process has degraded to the point where the corruption and graft are even more blatant this time. Many of the current cabinet were involved in the Reagan admin too. Their actions are the same - gutting the administrative state, squashing environmental regulations, persecuting queer people and racial minorities. Mass deportations. These were all hallmarks of the terrible Reagan presidency too. Even "Make America Great Again" is a reused slogan from the Reagan days. Unfortunately the same uneducated morons who hold Reagan up as a great president are behind Trump right now, cheering this car crash of an administration even as they get us involved in new wars.

mmooss 6mo ago
I think that normalizes the radical changes Trump has made, including aggressively challenging election results, ending the independence of the Department of Justice and FBI, and using them to attack political enemies, extraordinary expansion of a federal law enforcement force (apparently to serve Trump's political interests), nationalist trade policies including high tariffs, undermining national security allies, undermining intelligence secrecy, appointing people highly unqualified by existing standards, threatening freedom of the press (including having private sector allies acquire a dominant share of news and other public communication), ...
- solid_fuel 6mo ago
  You're right that it's worse this time, but I draw the comparison because I believe the same forces are at work. Reagan was installed because republicans and racists (I repeat myself) were upset about the civil rights movement. Trump was installed because republicans were upset about gay marriage and trans people. It's all grievance politics from the worlds most fragile children.
  - krapp 6mo ago
    > Trump was installed because republicans were upset about gay marriage and trans people. And Obama. Trumpism was in part a reactionary movement against mainstream conservatism from the alt-right/Tea Party set that the Republicans tried to court and control, who turned against the establishment when the Republicans wouldn't go far enough. It isn't at all a coincidence that the President after Obama was the man responsible for normalizing many of the conspiracy theories about him.